Is Your Protagonist on the Last Page?

Last night at book club, a member said, “I always read the first chapter, then the last page.” We all gasped, of course, and leaned a little further away from her. She explained, “I want to make sure the protagonist is still around at the end of the story. I’ve been burned a few times. I don’t have the time to invest in a book where the protagonist isn’t still around in the end.”

It makes sense, actually. One of the biggest complaints about Michael Ondaatje’s Divisadero in my other book club was the fact that we were introduced to a group of characters and their conflicts early on in the story and then ‘blam,’ we’re off on other adventures and some of those conflicts were left unresolved. Those characters were not on the last page, so to speak.

So the question is, what do you think? Do you have your protagonist on the last page? If not, what are your reasons?

In case you are curious, my protagonist is always on the last page of all my stories. Right there, tied up with a nice little bow and her happy Disney-ending rainbow. (Only, not quite that cheesy, as I don’t want to make my readers barf all over the book.)

All the more reason not to make your reader barf.